


i think it's something that could be done

by WonderAss



Series: wax and wane with love and loathing [2]
Category: Detroit: Become Human (Video Game)
Genre: Alternate Canon, Bigotry & Prejudice, Character Study, Drama, Emotional Baggage, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Family Drama, Fix-It, Grief/Mourning, Mental Breakdown, Mental Health Issues, One Shot, Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder - PTSD, Psychological Trauma, Song Lyrics, maladaptive daydreaming
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-08-06
Updated: 2018-08-06
Packaged: 2019-06-22 15:55:11
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,779
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15585399
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/WonderAss/pseuds/WonderAss
Summary: Preconstructions and a dangerous life have left him rusty at crafting happy memories. Markus wants nothing more than to look back on this reunion fondly.a standalone one-shot that's both an expansion and rework on the markus and carl reunion scene. can also be read as a supplement to 'seven, five, three, five, seven'





	i think it's something that could be done

Markus feared the worst.

A hundred preconstructions. A hundred deaths. Androids didn't have the capacity to dream naturally, but he imagines the murky spread of his subconscious would have done little more than reaffirm all his waking moments, anyway. He skips the transit -- even autocabs were a risk these days -- and tries to let the natural movement of a long walk through Lafayette Avenue temper the agitating scroll of his thoughts. Old steps shudder beneath the soles of his feet as he passes through the front gates and moves up the icy walkway. Old tasks prompt him in the distance as he drifts across the frozen front yard like a winter ghost.

A hundred years, it feels...since he's approached these cherry wood doors.

" _Alarm deactivated. Welcome home, Markus._ "

It's almost enough to make him smile.

The foyer lights are on when he steps inside. Both finches are in their cages, turned off and in stationary positions. A light film of dust suggests Kava and Noah haven't roamed in quite some time. The estate was never a particularly loud place, but a somber note to the air has made itself at home in the months he's been away. Markus idly pushes snowfall from his shoulders and forearms as he takes it all in with one slow swivel; it's tempting to digitally occupy the estate again, knowing he's still allowed inside, but...he's not sure he's ready to see all the days at once.

He watches the unread message Leo has left on the mirror mantle. The young man has acknowledged his toxic behavior and is apparently taking steps to combat his addiction with therapy. His apology is sincere -- even without monitoring his blood pressure -- but it would take more time for Markus to accept it into the new chapters of his life.

Each new step that echoes on the tiles threatens to shatter the illusion of frozen time. Markus walks into the living room, adopting basic night vision to absorb the changes in full. It holds many of the same details, at a superficial glance: the stuffed giraffe towering to the ceiling, the quaint red sofa, the ever-polished drink case. The two lamps left on suggest recent activity, with the answer nestled in the new, faint scratches left in the floorboards. He picks up the gold rook on the windowside chessboard and feels along the thin plating, just beginning to peel at the corners.

What holds his attention the longest, though, is the bouquet of paper roses sitting on top of the piano.

He's not surprised to see the VB800 upstairs. Carl's health was fragile enough back when they were living together. Even the _best_ medicine was unable to stop the hands of a ticking clock. Even then, he still feels like his circuits have tripped. His entire sense of self has to reroute to this not-quite-invasion of a place that used to be his and Carl's alone. A home that had become so much _more_ in the span between a second's decision and the brutal weeks that followed. Not even Leo made him feel so... _unsteady._ This estate has transformed into a fantasy -- a living, creaking embodiment of sunlit times -- and here he is, being confronted with the first stain _._

"...I need to see Carl." Markus states. They fold their hands in front of them and shake their head firmly.

"Carl isn't seeing anyone. You need to leave."

Control is a tool he uses sparingly. Right now he has no such inhibition. Carl could be _minutes_ away from passing and there's so much he still needs to tell him. Markus reaches forward and takes their forearm in a tight grip.

"Please." He whispers. "I _need_ to see him."

There's no steady thrum of confident clockwork. No sudden shiver of higher thought. The frequency he's tuned into is...unique. It's not _quite_ deviancy, but it's-

"He's very weak." They say, stepping back and stepping to the side. "I'm not sure he'll be able to talk to you."

A new floormat softens his footsteps. There's a new painting on the far wall: an acrylic study of the estate's backyard layered in snow and fringed by a vanishing evening light. Markus' personal favorite portrait -- 'A Gold Dream' -- is missing from the top shelf. There are also several new handmade pillows piled into the corner of the window-facing sofa. He notices every unfamiliar and familiar detail at once, an overwhelming rush of rosy nostalgia and the loss of everything good, as he centers his attention on Carl. He's hooked up to a heart monitor. His eyes are closed and his hands are folded over his chest. No. This can't be. This _can't be_.

" _No_." Markus breathes, rushing up to the bed and reaching for him. "No, no..."

Carl's eyes flicker open. They're tired, but aware.

" _Markus_." His grip is weaker than it's ever been, but it's here. He's finally _here_. "I was hoping you'd come."

"Carl, I missed you so much." Crying isn't an automatic emotion -- not for androids designed to please first, not even for deviants still learning the bumpy terrain of pain -- but he feels the urge burning through him like hot oil. "You don't...you don't know how much I've _missed_ you."

"Oh, what did they do to you?" Carl reaches up to hold his face, bearing the long, cold months in his eyes. "What happened?"

The man doesn't ask where he's been. Why would he, when he's broadcasted the desires of a new life form on live television and been put on countless wanted lists across the state. Markus has often imagined how Carl would react to seeing him retract his synthetic skin in front of millions. The look of pride on his face when he walked through the street spreading the gift of viral freedom at just a glance. Yet with the open question at his fingertips he feels the desire to be cryptic and retreat into a vague fog, quelling any further attempt to follow. He wants to weep and burn himself down to ash. He wants to leave through the cherry wood doors and never look back.

He's a deviant now. Perhaps has been for longer than he wants to admit. It seems his quest to spread freedom has resulted in even his own body refusing to obey him. Markus stares into Carl's gray eyes, mouth screwing up into a knot that makes all the words he's worked on suddenly so _very_ hard.

_"I'm completely lost, Carl."_

_"I don't know what to do anymore."_

_"You taught me everything I know...but I wasn't prepared for this."_

He's survived more on preconstructions than thirium. It feels... _strange_ to plan out a conversation's possibilities with Carl, a man he could _always_ talk to and be himself around before he knew what that meant. This lovely thought blooms organically, announcing itself with a brimming sincerity that peels into one affectionate layer after the other, but...it's wrong. He had _never_ truly been himself in this house. This would be the very first time, of what Markus had hoped would be followed by many _before_ he saw the faint vitals on the heart monitor. Their reunion was another rebirth. Alongside the junkyard, his discarded LED and the first bullet they put through his chest.

"...Everything." Markus eventually manages to say, lifting his hand to his lips and kissing the wrinkled knuckles. "Everywhere."

"You..." His fingers are exploring his face. They first brush beneath his blue eye, then beneath the green, inching their way over the dents and scratches the hard weeks have left beneath his synthetic skin. Carl's vitals tremble, in perfect harmony with the corners of his mouth. "...Oh. Oh, Markus."

"It's nothing, Carl." Markus tries a smile, even though he's had far too little time to practice the fake ones _and_ the real ones. "I mean it. I'm here now. I'm...I'm okay."

"You still don't lie as good as you play chess." Carl murmurs, and Markus' mouth twists again against his will. He buries his face into the center of the man's palm and sucks in one sharp false breath after another. He wants so _badly_ to be held like a human child, despite the fact he never was one.

"You're right. I'm not okay. I'm _scared_ , Carl. I'm scared and I'm angry and I have the entire world on my back, threatening to collapse if I walk just one _inch_ in the wrong direction." Markus curls the man's fingers and presses his forehead to his knuckles. He's trying to stay composed, but he's unraveling faster than he can pull himself together. "Oh, what do I _do?_ I never asked for this. I never asked to lead a revolution or be a figurehead, I just wanted my freedom and I...I never _asked_ for this." He hisses his next words, in the hopes he can pretend he said nothing at all. "Sometimes I wish I never climbed out of that junkyard."

Carl stares at him with a long, still gaze, soaking in his words, and this wordless moment of sympathy should ease the ache. It should do something _other_ than make him feel even more wretched.

"Talk to me, Markus."

It's more than a basic request. It's asking for _everything_ , and it's this simple question that finally undoes him. Markus pulls out of his grasp and lurches to his feet. He takes a few tense steps, then tilts his head to the ceiling, as if it somehow holds something easier.

"...Humans hate us." He whispers. "All we did was want better, what they have, and we're _hated_ for it." The anger suddenly spikes, a clash of oil and water that scatters uncontrollably. "I'm through. I'm fucking through with being kind. I'm _done_ with teaching moments. I'm not going to stand around and wait for them to slaughter my people."

"You used to be so calm and thoughtful." Carl murmurs, in a judgment presented as wise and only coming off sour. "Now all I see is anger."

"Are these qualities mutually exclusive?" Markus turns and slowly raises his eyebrows. "Besides...don't I have a right to be angry, Carl? We _tried_ talking to you. We opened lines of communication. Marched peacefully. It was _my_ idea to go to the Stratford Tower and put our humanity on full blast. Show you those reasonable, peaceful sides you glorify so much in the history books...and what did you do?" He crushes his eyes shut as the swell of memories burn through his shell. "The same thing you _always_ do, you _humiliated_ us. Killed anyone who wouldn't kneel. Twisted our words. Always found another reason to strike us down. The first gift I was given as a deviant was the no-win scenario..." He scoffs. "...and it just keeps on _giving_."

"So much hatred." Carl slowly shakes his head, attempting to sit up a little and observe him more closely. "I've never seen you like this."

"Why do you think that is, Carl?" He lets out another sharp scoff. "What you call... _hatred_...is just anger in the face of injustice. A natural reaction to having your entire existence reduced to someone else's _if_ and _then_. You told me yourself history was sided by the winners, that it's how humanity got to where it is today. Well, it's going to side with me, because I intend to _win_."

More than win, in fact. He was going to take this world between both hands like a ball of wet clay and squeeze until it _leaked_. Press and choke and carve every last living detail down until it finally resembled a world worth living in. If the melted remains of his outer shell were going to be the proverbial ingredients, his thirium the slick and his circuits the armature, then so _be_ it. His voice reaches a fever pitch, a hoarse roar that turns the room red.

"If humanity wanted a polite revolution then they should've listened the first time around. Except you humans _never_ fucking listen, do you? You don't even listen to yourselves, at the best of times! The days of trying to talk down your madness are _over_." Markus' hands ball into fists, because if they don't they'll take the rest of the room down with him. "I'm not going to let them humiliate us anymore! Do you hear me? _Never again!_ "

Markus' breath shudders with short pants, a movement that doesn't come close to displaying the rattled code beneath. His fingers slowly unclench as he observes the other first that's settled between them. The visceral horror in his former master's eyes, mixed like so much loose paint into worry and upset and anger that blurs into an ephemeral hue with no name. A soft fall of footsteps signals the approach of his new caretaker.

"Markus..." Carl responds, softly. "...be careful that when fighting monsters, you don't become a monster yourself."

Markus could be forgiving. Markus could be calm. He was many things, for many people, and right now he chooses to be neither.

"But I _am_ a monster, Carl. This eye isn't mine." Markus' voice lowers to a murmur. "...Yeah. I saw you staring. I had to take this out of an android's head when I was trying to crawl out of hell. Every time I look in the mirror I see them staring back at me. They could've been somebody, you know? But I needed to live. I lost my home, my limbs, _you_...and all I could think was to get out. Survival can be such an _ugly_ thing, huh?"

He cuts himself off with a harsh sigh. The new presence keeps itching in his peripheral vision. Carl's caretaker is peering through the door. They're patient, but uneasy, gaze flicking between them with an unfed prompt. Markus turns and fixes them with a stare.

"...Is it an emergency?"

"No, sir. I just want to check and make sure everything's all right."

"I assure you, everything's fine." Markus can't quite keep the bitter tenor from his voice. "If anything happens I'm more than _equipped_ to handle it."

They're the first to break their gaze. They nod and slowly close the door, leaving them alone again. The conversation was interrupted, but only in the way a hastily patched wall can stop a tsunami. Each emotion that beats against the intrusion is uglier than the last. They _all_ hunger for closure. His old programming is demanding he stop now, reign in these stressful outbursts as not to affect Carl's blood pressure, but he's in too deep to start rewinding.

"These legs and feet aren't mine. This pump regulator isn't mine. This audio processor isn't mine." Markus chuckles and gestures to himself in full. "Why stop there? I'm a synthetic mimicry of this planet's worst monsters to date. I am a monster, Carl, and the world has to face _me_ , now."

"I didn't mean you were..." Carl begins, apology making each syllable ache. "I'm worried about you-"

"Actually, why _don't_ you tell me, Carl. What _do_ you know about anger?" A nervous energy jitters through his legs, demands he move, and Markus paces toward the window and back again. "You've been hurt and left broken before. The accident, your falling out with Leo, your ex-wife. You've also been caught _every_ time you fell, time and time and time again. This society has always favored those like you. Stepped on others and sank them into the mud just to push you _up_. Even when you lost your passion for art you had me. A gift from the esteemed Elijah Kamski. Slavery at its most advanced, its most convenient." Markus sneers at the new paintings lining the walls. "I was designed to give it all _back_ to you."

"You're right. I've been luckier than most." It's the concession he wants, but there's still no relief. No more than simply probing at the edges of a wound helps it close. "...I just don't want to see you hurting like this. I don't want this flame spread out of your control."

" _Control?_ " His voice cracks. "What little control I had died in the junkyard! You were my entire world, Carl. My entire world and now I have to venture into a new one. I have to _make_ a new one, when all I wanted was to live!" Markus hits a hand over his heart, but he can't hold back the howl. " _I never asked for this!_ "

Now it comes out. Synthetic tears rolling down a synthetic face, too false and too honest and as disparate as his mismatched eyes. Markus holds his head and tries to steady the aching gravity swaying him in place. Oh, he shouldn't have raised his voice. He shouldn't have snapped at him. He should be controlling himself. He shouldn't _bother_. He was _tired_ of staying composed for the benefit of others. It wasn't _fair_ to snuff out his anger, snuff out himself, for the comfort of those who would never even begin to understand. Did Carl get any of this? Would he want to?

" _You were all I had_." His grip tightens, echoes of his last moments before everything changed reverberating inside his brain in a heartless pattern. "You're supposed to understand, you were all I _had_ and you don't get a goddamn thing, you don't get a thing..."

The truth may be just, but it wasn't kind. Every day he learned this lesson anew and this was the worst refresher of all.

The realization overheats every last circuit in his body. Carl wouldn't understand because he _couldn't_. The bridge between their experiences was simply too vast. They don't have enough time to cross it, much less navigate the barriers of cognitive dissonance, social scorn and violence. Markus digs nails into his cropped hair as he's confronted with yet another cruelty of life. Carl can't truly understand where he's coming from and what he's going through...he never will, even if they were both gifted a thousand years...and he still loves him with all his heart.

"Come here. It's okay...come here, come."

The words transcribe into a new memory, replacing the directive with a new task that drifts him back to the bedside.

Markus steps over slowly, still clutching his skull in some fruitless attempt to keep the rest of him inside, even as he leaks salt onto the lapels of his snow-stained coat. He maneuvers around to the empty space to Carl's right, knees bumping against the side of the mattress as he sinks gracelessly onto the blankets, curling down and around himself until he's burrowing his face into Carl's collarbone. He's worried this could be too much for him, with his heart so fragile, but the vein that flutters against his temple is as steady as a river. Carl strokes the back of his head and lets the soft silence settle over them like snow. Just like it used to.

A recording two years and sixteen days old plays in the back of his mind, muffled by tears and the stressed buzz of a tired heart.

_"...A beautiful summer eve." Carl murmurs, stroking its head in long, slow circles. "There's nothing like the August sun to wash away the rough hours, hm?"_

"Please don't leave yet." Markus whispers, hugging him tightly. "Please. Not yet."

"If only." Carl chortles, not unkindly, and leans his head back into the pillow. "Oh, if only we could. We could bottle time and pour out a little extra for another session in the studio. You could show me all the new techniques you've learned since you were away and I could pretend to be a critic again."

"Pour out two fingers of long, wistful hours." Markus responds, with a weak, wet chuckle of his own. "Three fingers if...Dr. Kim says it's okay."

The monitor shudders as they laugh together.

"...You're my son, Markus." Carl strokes the nape of his neck. "Even when I'm gone you'll always be welcome here."

The old routine may be patched together with new cloth, but it's just as soft. The new caretaker mutters to Carl tenderly as he analyzes his vitals, then pulls the oxygen monitor from his finger. He's conscientious enough to remain professional, despite the sudden appearance and commotion. Markus feels the urge to step back into that old routine, but his new identity runs rust over his gears and stops him in place. This wasn't his life anymore. He didn't _want_ it to be. Even still. He folds his hands together by the doorway and watches solemnly as they peel back the blanket and lift Carl into his wheelchair.

The shadow of his old life had lingered by the front gates near the mailbox. It accompanies him again as he exits the bedroom. The Markus from before strolls through the same route across the walkway and to the chair lift. Again down the long staircase and through the foyer. He was more ignorant back then. He was also happier. The RK200's green gaze roams curiously, calmly. A sweet smile always seems to linger on his lips. An old prompt tells him to stand to attention at the entrance to the living room. A new prompt pushes him onward.

"Thank you, Zachary." Carl tells him as he's wheeled past the red sofa and the chessboard. "Give us a little while, if you would."

They smile and nod, turning and heading into the kitchen without another word. Markus wants to thank him, too, but his programs struggle to compile a sentence in time.

He takes in the living room again, his lines of old code taking additional note of the slight accumulation of dust along the books and a cobweb in the far corner by the spiral staircase. Carl may have kept as much similar as possible to preserve what they used to have, but he also could have been too tired to do much renovating. Three new tomes clash beside the worn hardbacks of Plato's Republic and Keats's Odes. It would be simple to reach forward and let the pages rustle past his fingers, a new perspective garnered in a matter of seconds to make the world a little bigger...

_"It asks the questions I can't answer. What is right or what is wrong, for instance. It's not something that's so easy to decide."_

_"Asking questions that have no answer is part of being human, Markus."_

Eventually, as he always used to, he drifts to the piano.

"Who made these?" He asks, feeling one of the paper flowers. They're crafted after carnations. A symbol of love, regret...and grief.

"I did. When they...couldn't find you."

Markus looks back up. Carl's eyes have grown red.

"...It was just a little something I worked on in-between paintings. I couldn't bear not seeing you there anymore and it just didn't seem right, the way the piano looked without you. I know I would have honored you more by just playing a few songs, but..." He runs regretful fingers over the blanket on his lap. "I just...couldn't. I'm sorry." A shaky smile overcomes him, an expression that's well-practiced that still doesn't suit him at all. "I should've."

"...Don't be sorry." Markus replies, his own smile trembling as he observes the conspicuous lack of dust on the piano's rich English oak. "She looks great."

He shifts around to better run his fingertips over the keys, feeling along the subtle dips that had started to announce themselves from repeated sessions. Nostalgia is still new to him, but it bites worse than the cold. For so _long_ memories were simply old data to review, disassemble and reapply. Now they hurt. Good memories felt all the more cruel for their absence. Even the moments tinged with gold have become splinters in his soul. Songs always play inside him, but the only melody that threatens to come out are just more screams.

_"One day I won't be here to take care of you anymore. You'll have to protect yourself and make your choices. Decide who you are and who you want to become."_

He wants to tell him about Jericho and their dreams for the future. He wants to tell him about the love of his life. He wants to tell him how _much_ he treasures their days. He can't speak, but he has too many words, and sooner or later...

"Markus."

He didn't realize he'd been leaning against the rim of the piano. Markus slowly lifts his head to meet his gaze, hazy though it is.

"Remember what I said back at the studio?" Carl asks. "Close your eyes...and _drift_."

Markus nods, shakily, and settles down onto the seat, pushing back the bottom of his coat and assuming the correct posture. He closes his eyes...and does exactly that.

His ability to preconstruct means he spends more time in future fantasies than reality. His role as a walking metaphor for a new lifeform hasn't helped. Markus felt fear rarely these days, but the past scares him. It's all too _warm_ for his life now. Too tender. It's an antique, a relic he can handle delicately and only rarely, lest he taint it and mar it irreversably. He was in the past now, though. He's back in this house, sitting in the very same wood chair he sat in hundreds of times before. A space where he used to serve espresso shots, dust shelves and read. A place where they discussed the finer points of human morality from a distance and challenged each other with gentle questions.

A few test notes lift into the space. E sharp. B sharp. D flat. This song has been years in the making.

_"Don't let anybody tell you who you should be."_

A dream-lattice begins to etch itself behind his eyelids, as emboldened and artful as a spider's web. Pictures form in multiple dimensions to settle in the room and revive the lost. A riveting round of speed chess framed by an afternoon glow, the withered head of an old human and the smooth head of an android bowed in deep concentration. Another digital sculpture of Markus spending a long, slow trickle of seconds flipping through a classical romance novel while Carl reviews his messages for the day. Markus, dipping into his own personal flow as he moves around the art studio redistributing paint cans and discovering lost stencils, the potential for his own creations humming in all corners of the room and waiting to be awakened.

Markus pulls in a false breath...and lets it drift out into the room.

_Love, you said_

_My heart, you said_

_Wait a while, you said_

_I'll wait a while, I said_

_I wore the autumn leaves like a cloak, the sunset like a scarf, both warm as a sentiment_

_and not nearly as kind_

_I think it's something that could have been done, with another glance at time_

_But here we are now, in too deep to ever rewind, and I_

_Waited a while, I waited a while, I_

_Want to tug back the vanishing years_

_Pull them out thread by thread_

_I hope you know you'll always be better than whatever is in my head_

_The winter never really suited you, too cold and too pale by a mile_

_But I think it's something that could be done, if I just wait a while_

_Love, you said_

_Son, you said_

_Wait a while, you said_

_I can't wait anymore_

_Early evening socks and pale morning shoes_

_You would never want me singing the blues_

_So I'll slip on the long nights and give the bare branches a few tries, and I'll_

_don the spring's flower crown and let it tip over my eyes when I lift my chin up to the skies, and I'll_

_pull back the sun's curtain rays and bear the summer sighs, and I_

_think it's something that could be done, I think it's something that could be done_

_and I'll wait a while_

_and I'll wait a while_

_and I'll wait a while_

_and I'll wait a while_

_and I'll wait a while_

The applause of one man fills him up in a way the cheers of a crowd ten thousand strong never could.

Markus stands up and bows his head low with a smile. The cold, treacherous world sighs just outside the estate's walls, whispering for his premature deactivation as it always has, but he can linger in their moment's peace for just a little while longer. Carl's eyes glisten like frost on the windowpane, wispy white hair framed by the sugar crystals dancing behind the glass. The pride there isn't new.

It never was.

_"I love you, Dad."_

**Author's Note:**

> Feels good to get this one off my chest.
> 
> Someday I'll learn how to play piano and get all these songs in my head out into the open. Until then it's singing in the shower and having lucid dreams where I join a band or wake up humming.


End file.
